Happy New Year to Me!

This week, I celebrated a birthday, one of the “milestone” birthdays. One that those who have already celebrated it are wont to tease you about. So this year, I decided to take the day off from work and have a “me” day. I took myself to lunch at one of my favorite places, got a massage, and did a little shopping. (Note to self: This is the perfect way to spend my birthday every year. Please calendar it now for next year.)

This year, I also decided that, because my birthday is so close to the beginning of the year, AND because it falls at the end of the Jones birthday season, I would re-christen my birthday as my own personal, New Year’s Day. Somehow, now that I have added a small child to the mix of holidays, travel, Rose Parade, and our January birthdays (not to mention my full-time job), I never manage to find the time for self-reflection and goal-setting that is encouraged at this time of year, which means that I never actually self-reflect or set goals in any meaningful, deliberate way.

We once had a minister that encouraged each of us in his congregation to use the start of the church year as our New Year, rather than waiting until January 1 when things are still so busy. While I thought that was a very lovely idea, it certainly isn’t a less-busy time for me, since the start of the church calendar is sometime around the end of November or first of December, otherwise known as just after Thanksgiving, right in the throes of Christmas shopping and trying to finish projects at work so I can take some time off over the holidays and not feel completely overwhelmed by doing so.

So I am riffing off of his idea, and instead of re-setting and re-evaluating at the beginning of the church year or the beginning of the actual calendar year as many people do, I am choosing to do it at the beginning of my year. Since this idea came to me in the shower on my birthday, I am running a little behind in actually executing the self-reflection and goal-setting (a/k/a setting New Year’s resolutions and longer-term aspirations) but it is a work in progress. And now that I have my plan in place, my new tradition if you will, I will be primed and ready to execute next birthday. Stay tuned for this year’s reflections and goals. Meanwhile, I am really glad to Albert bought extra red velvet cupcakes for my birthday. I am looking forward to continuing the celebration with another one tonight!